Jill Scott: "Back In The Day If A Black Man Looked At A White Woman, He Would've Been Lynched, Beaten, Jailed Or Shot To Death"

You know the moment when you realize that fine, accomplished brother is with a White woman? Let's call it "the wince." Three-time Grammy Award-winning artist, writer, actress, philanthropist, mother and all-around Renaissance woman, Jill Scott gets to the root of our feelings on the matter.

My new friend is handsome, African-American, intelligent and seemingly wealthy. He is an athlete, loves his momma, and is happily married to a White woman. I admit when I saw his wedding ring, I privately hoped. But something in me just knew he didn't marry a sister. Although my guess hit the mark, when my friend told me his wife was indeed Caucasian, I felt my spirit...wince. I didn't immediately understand it. My face read happy for you. My body showed no reaction to my inner pinch, but the sting was there, quiet like a mosquito under a summer dress.

Was I jealous? Did the reality of his relationship somehow diminish his soul's credibility? The answer is not simple. One could easily dispel the wince as racist or separatist, but that's not how I was brought up. I was reared in a Jehovah's Witness household. I was taught that every man should be judged by his deeds and not his color, and I firmly stand where my grandmother left me. African people worldwide are known to be welcoming and open-minded. We share our culture sometimes to our own peril and most of us love the very notion of love. My position is that for women of color, this very common "wince" has solely to do with the African story in America.

When our people were enslaved, "Massa" placed his Caucasian woman on a pedestal. She was spoiled, revered and angelic, while the Black slave woman was overworked, beaten, raped and farmed out like cattle to be mated. She was nothing and neither was our Black man. As slavery died for the greater good of America, and the movement for equality sputtered to life, the White woman was on the cover of every American magazine. She was the dazzling jewel on every movie screen, the glory of every commercial and television show. She was unequivocally the standard of beauty for this country, firmly unattainable to anyone not of her race. We daughters of the dust were seen as ugly, nappy mammies, good for day work and unwanted children, while our men were thought to be thieving, sex-hungry animals with limited brain capacity.

We reflect on this awful past and recall that if a Black man even looked at a White woman, he would have been lynched, beaten, jailed or shot to death. In the midst of this, Black women and Black men struggled together, mourned together, starved together, braved the hoses and vicious police dogs and died untimely on southern back roads together. These harsh truths lead to what we really feel when we see a seemingly together brother with a Caucasian woman and their children. That feeling is betrayed. While we exert efforts to raise our sons and daughters to appreciate themselves and respect others, most of us end up doing this important work alone, with no fathers or like representatives, limited financial support (often court-enforced) and, on top of everything else, an empty bed. It's frustrating and it hurts!

Our minds do understand that people of all races find genuine love in many places. We dig that the world is full of amazing options. But underneath, there is a bite, no matter the ointment, that has yet to stop burning. Some may find these thoughts to be hurtful. That is not my intent. I'm just sayin'.

http://www.essence.com/relationships/commentary_3/commentary_jill_scott_talks_interracial.php

I like Jill Scott, but I never understood women like this. Not just black women, but women in general who bemoan over men who want something other than what they are. How can you get mad at someone for what they find attractive? Unless they are imposing their preferences on you, how is it even your business?

Older women seething with resentment over men their age who want younger women is another good analogy. The only thing to do is stand tall, move on and find true happiness with someone who DOES appreciate your type. Don't pine for someone who doesn't want you. It just makes you seem pathetic.

The "wince" that she refers to is not rational, it's not conscious, it's completely involuntary. But it's there. To deny that feeling would be a lie. It's not a conscious judgement on someone else's relationship and it doesn't affect how you value that relationship, well, it certainly shouldn't anyway. All she's really doing is acknowledging a feeling and maybe prompting some healthy discussion on the matter. You can only change and grow if you acknowledge something first.

The main problem I have with her argument is about how she says white women were treated. Women, no matter their skin color, have long been considered a man's property. Not anymore, obviously, but traditional marriage is a holdover from a time when the ownership of a woman was transferred from her parents to her husband. A woman had to change her last name. A woman waited on her husband, met his needs and never acknowledged her own. Men paid a dowry for a wife. Basically, women were as enslaved as slaves but the chains were invisible. Her inability to recognize this, and her willingness to embrace the Gone With the Wind romantic notion of white women, totally invalidates her argument.

Dan wrote:

The main problem I have with her argument is about how she says white women were treated. Women, no matter their skin color, have long been considered a man's property. Not anymore, obviously, but traditional marriage is a holdover from a time when the ownership of a woman was transferred from her parents to her husband. A woman had to change her last name. A woman waited on her husband, met his needs and never acknowledged her own. Men paid a dowry for a wife. Basically, women were as enslaved as slaves but the chains were invisible. Her inability to recognize this, and her willingness to embrace the Gone With the Wind romantic notion of white women, totally invalidates her argument.

Exactly. And that's also my problem with her argument. Yes, black women were treated terribly by their slave owners. But so were white women. They were also beaten, abused and raped by their husbands. They had no rights, were nothing more than property. A white woman had to accept the fact that her husband could go out in the middle of the night and have sex with the slave girl. There was nothing she could do to stop him. In my opinion, this debate should not be about black woman vs. white woman. They were BOTH victims of the white man. He was the real oppressor.

I get the gist of what Jill Scott is saying, but I can't take this too much to heart because she's only talking about black men and white women. To me, the next obvious point would be about black women and white men, and what that means from a cultural perspective.

To leave that out says to me that her perspective is too lacking to be taken with the kind of impact I think she's going for.

But then it's just her opinion and mine, so I guess that doesn't mean much either way.

I'm on the fence where collectivism versus individual relationships comes into the debate, because I think the truth is somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. But I'm also a believer that at the end of the day, personal identity has to take precedence, which means she really doesn't have the right to tell anyone who they should or shouldn't be with...or even lecture to them about her feelings about their relationships. If it was a broader cultural issue she was discussing, it would be different.

But just talking about black men and who they date, it does unfortunately also have that eau of sour grapes.

Bent1670 wrote:

Dan wrote:

The main problem I have with her argument is about how she says white women were treated. Women, no matter their skin color, have long been considered a man's property. Not anymore, obviously, but traditional marriage is a holdover from a time when the ownership of a woman was transferred from her parents to her husband. A woman had to change her last name. A woman waited on her husband, met his needs and never acknowledged her own. Men paid a dowry for a wife. Basically, women were as enslaved as slaves but the chains were invisible. Her inability to recognize this, and her willingness to embrace the Gone With the Wind romantic notion of white women, totally invalidates her argument.

Exactly. And that's also my problem with her argument. Yes, black women were treated terribly by their slave owners. But so were white women. They were also beaten, abused and raped by their husbands. They had no rights, were nothing more than property. A white woman had to accept the fact that her husband could go out in the middle of the night and have sex with the slave girl. There was nothing she could do to stop him. In my opinion, this debate should not be about black woman vs. white woman. They were BOTH victims of the white man. He was the real oppressor.

Eh...

Despite the overall misogyny and oppression of the times, the wives of wealthy plantation owners often had it pretty damn good, and they were held up as the standard of what feminine beauty and motherhood was supposed to be. The kind of "slavery" you're talking about is the kind of "slavery" many women still willingly choose. I'm betting Melania Trump doesn't feel like a slave.

Notice so many of these women only wanna scrutinize the relationship patterns of "successful" black men, while not giving that much of a shit about who the brutha working the drive-thru window at Taco Bell is dating and why? They openly SNUB him as not being worth dating until somebody realize he got a marketable talent that eventually allows him property in the Hamptons. Then all of the sudden it's this issue that he got Becky on his arm. But when he was broke and living with his moms Keisha wasn't giving him the time of day. That shit is hypocritical to me.

If you cant EVER seem to attract type you want, look @ yourself and ponder why they would want you.

I totally see where Jill is coming from. I don't mind Interracial relationships. Really, I don't. In fact, I think they can be a beautiful sentiment of acceptance and love transcending race, creed and blah-blah-blah.

If you're Black, and are presently dating interracially, but the one before them was Black...the one before that was Arab, the one before that was Hindu, etc., etc....and none of these relationships were fundamentally based on an ethnic fetish, but rather having common interests and genuinely liking each other, then that's terrific. I applaud your open-mindedness.

However, I do not respect people who have interracial dating agendas. People who date outside of their race to the deliberate exclusion of their own are head cases IMO. I think they unconsciously hope that their partners race, ethnicity or hue will somehow rub off on them. At the end of the day, people can do whatever they want. They can date whoever they want for whatever reasons...no matter how shallow or disingenuous...but people are allowed to have opinions on the broad topic.

I think successful black people tend to be intimidated, threatened by, and suspicious of each other, period. There are so many subsets of black American society and culture now; I think it would be hard for Jill to judge her friend.

Once black men get successful, they travel. Black women then become less available. The ones that are available are usually on the sidelines, turning their noses up at the white groupies converging on wealthy black men like flies to nectar. White women are just more available. Same with successful black women. Janet Jackson is middle aged and alone. She said that men were intimidated too, and Im sure a lot of black men were afraid of that success. Halle Berry went through crazy Eric Benet and the beautiful Michael Ealy. She ended up with a white baby daddy.

Jill has a new baby, and her relationship with the father didnt work out. Maybe he left her for a white woman? Maybe her first husband left her for a white woman? I still think she's tremendous.